It's been over a year. I'm a 2nd year med student at the ASMPH now, and all i can say is, I made a wise decision by entering this school. I can't see myself thriving and enjoying med school life (academically and socially) anywhere else than here
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In fact, i can't express enough how excited i still am about everything in this school. And if you have fears about the professors and mentors, oh man, i can promise you that you won't get as large a pool of
highly qualified physician-instructors as you would here (except for a couple other schools maybe
).
I also don't want to miss out on the point that we had a lot of clinical exposure in our first year and learnt most physical examination procedures that other schools teach only in 3rd year or 2nd year at best. In fact we did physical examinations on real OB patients at the Quirino Memorial Medical Center already. Most others of course were with volunteers at school. For history taking, we had our experience at the Medical City hospital in our first month or so of med school
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Anyway, just to inform everyone, we are obtaining an
MBA degree, and not an MM. I assure you, management education will make a huge difference to your medical careers. In fact, if you look at many renowned/successful doctors, they have a masters degree as well (it's harder to get this in the middle of your medical career). By the way, we also just had our summer internship for management (I had mine at the American Eye Center) from May to June 2008... so many things we gained!
Anyway, I hope to see many more of you in the future! Our country has more hope than you may perceive it has
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God bless everyone!
3 years have passed; it seems all too quick. I'm going into clerkship (YL8) in about a months time. If there was anything that i felt upon realizing that the last few days of my school year was nearing, it was that of nostalgic gratitude.
I learnt so much in those classrooms... from my professors, my patients, my peers...
I never would have imagined that i would look back 3 short years, and see on hindsight how much
i have grown in so many ways. Most importantly, i feel i really am on my way to becoming the doctor i hope to be,
holistic in approach to patient care, and always with
mindful concern about the patients' interests, and utmost desires and needs.
Year after year, it felt as if it only got better for us students. Definitely, from YL5-YL7, its gotten only
more exciting for us, with increasingly more exposure to patients, and more management classes as well, it really has given most of us enough
confidence to go out into the field, with
more excitement than fear. In fact, to culminate our YL7 (3rd Year), we had one-on-one preceptorials with consultants, where we each had to go through a complete history and physical examination on patients up to diagnosis and management (similar to UST's Revalida). It was comforting to see most of my peers at ease, maybe even eager, to show what they were capable of. We had to pass 2 of 3 patient encounters to be promoted. Most, if not all, probably made it.
I must admit, it was more this year that i really got to appreciate full well the
"spiral curriculum" the school had intended for us. Learning what was normal in an organ system basis at first year (YL5). Again, the abnormal in an organ system basis in YL6. And again, both the normal and abnormal, ingrained deeper and more meaningfully, as applied in the diagnosis and management of our patients in YL7. Our experience of the clinicals was made even richer with our added knowledge about
ethics and medical jurisprudence. It was completely exhilarating to have one of the cases (about medical negligence) reenacted in our class. An actual judge, some lawyers, and 2 doctors (acting as witnesses) reenacted a
moot court scene.
I can go on an on about the many fruitful events in my life in the ASMPH thus far, but suffice it to say, i simply want to reiterate what i have said year after year in this forum, that i made
the right decision to go into this institution.
One final note, for our clerkship rotations, we will be rotating in at least 7 hospitals, TMC, being the only private hospital, the others (without being specific), perhaps some of the best government hospitals in their fields
... believe me, there would be more than enough exposure and clinical experience to gain from.
To all those considering their Med School: When deciding your school... always ask what your primary goal is in becoming a doctor. When you read through the history of the school, and the various commentaries about the ASMPH, and by the end of it you are able to tell yourself that "this school is for me", then perhaps it might just be for you.
Congratulations to all the newly accepted medical students of ASMPH, Batch of 2015!
And I do hope everybody encourages everyone else, instead of being haters.
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